THE "ANACONDA SYSTEM"--HOW FAR IT WAS SUCCESSFUL--TERRITORIAL
CONFIGURATION OF THE SOUTH FAVORABLE TO THE ENEMY--ONE THEATRE OF WAR
FAVORABLE TO THE CONFEDERATES--THE FEDERAL FORCES IN VIRGINIA--THE
CONFEDERATE FORCES--THE POTOMAC LINES--CRITICAL SITUATION IN
VIRGINIA--EVACUATION OF MANASSAS--TRANSFER OF OPERATIONS TO THE
PENINSULA--MAGRUDER'S LINES--EVACUATION OF YORKTOWN--STRENGTH OF THE
OPPOSING FORCES BEFORE RICHMOND--DESTRUCTION OF THE "VIRGINIA"--PANIC
IN RICHMOND--MR. DAVIS' CALMNESS AND CONFIDENCE--HE AVOWS HIMSELF
"READY TO LEAVE HIS BONES IN THE CAPITAL OF THE CONFEDERACY"--REPULSE
OF THE GUNBOATS--"MEMENTOES OF HEROISM"--JACKSON'S VALLEY CAMPAIGN--A
SERIES OF VICTORIES, WITH IMPORTANT RESULTS--BATTLE OF "SEVEN
PINES"--A FAILURE--GENERAL JOHNSTON WOUNDED--PRESIDENT DAVIS ON THE
FIELD--PRESIDENT DAVIS AND GENERAL JOHNSTON--AN ATTEMPT TO FORESTALL
THE DECISION OF HISTORY--RESULTS OF LEE'S ACCESSION TO COMMAND--
JOHNSTON'S GENERALSHIP--MR. DAVIS' ESTIMATE OF LEE--LEE'S PLANS--THE
ADVISORY RELATION BETWEEN DAVIS AND LEE--THEIR MUTUAL CONFIDENCE NEVER
INTERRUPTED--CONFEDERATE STRATEGY AFTER M'CLELLAN'S DEFEAT BEFORE
RICHMOND--MAGICAL CHANGE IN THE FORTUNES OF THE CONFEDERACY--THE
INVASION OF MARYLAND--ANTIETAM--TANGIBLE PROOFS OF CONFEDERATE
SUCCESS--GENERAL BRAGG--HIS KENTUCKY CAMPAIGN--CONFEDERATE HOPES--
BATTLE OF PERRYVILLE--BRAGG RETREATS--ESTIMATE OF THE KENTUCKY
CAMPAIGN OF 1862--OTHER INCIDENTS OF THE WESTERN CAMPAIGN--REMOVAL OF
M'CLELLAN--A SOUTHERN OPINION OF M'CLELLAN--BATTLE OF FREDERICKSBURG--
BATTLE OF MURFREESBORO'--BATTLE OF PRAIRIE GROVE--THE SITUATION AT THE
CLOSE OF 1862--PRESIDENT DAVIS' RECOMMENDATIONS TO CONGRESS--HIS VISIT
TO THE SOUTH-WEST--ADDRESS BEFORE THE MISSISSIPPI LEGISLATURE.
The Federal Government frankly accepted the true teachings of the war in
its earlier stages, and no feature of the lesson was more palpable than
the inferiority of the North in the art of war and military
administration. No longer trusting, to any extent whatever, to a contest
of prowess with an enemy whose incomparable superiority was already
established, Mr. Lincoln, his cabinet, and his military advisers, were
concurrent in their convictions of the necessity of a policy which should
make available the numerical superiority of the North. The "anaconda
system" of General Scott, adhered to by General McClellan, and sanctioned
by the Government and the people, though by no means new in the theory and
practice of war, was based upon a just and sagacious view of the
situation.
To overwhelm the South by mere material weight, to crush the smaller body
by the momentum of a larger force, comprehends the Federal design of the
war, undertaken at the inception of operations in 1862. The success
attending the execution of this design we have described in preceding
pages. We have accredited to the enemy the full extent of his successes,
and endeavored to demonstrate that they resulted not from Confederate
maladministration, but from a vigorous and timely use of his advantages
and opportunity by the enemy. But while according to the North unexampled
energy in preparation, and an unstinted donation of its means to the
purpose, which it pursued with indomitable resolution, no concession of an
improved military capacity is demanded, from the fact that use was made of
obvious advantages not to be overlooked even by the stupidity of an Aulic
council.
We have shown that the preponderating influence in the achievement of the
enemy's victories in the winter and spring of 1862, was his naval
supremacy. Even at that period it was palpable that, without his navy, his
scheme of invasion would be the veriest abortion ever exposed to the
ridicule of mankind. The maritime facilities of the enemy were, in the
end, decisive of the contest in his favor.
Upon those fields of military operations which have thus far occupied our
attention, we have seen how propitious to the enemy's plans, in every
instance, was the geographical configuration. Wherever a navigable river
emptied into the sea, which was the undisputed domain of the North, or
intersected its territory, a short and, in many instances, almost
bloodless struggle had ended in the expulsion or capture of the
Confederates defending its passage. Yet, in many instances, these results
had a most serious bearing upon the decision of the war. It was impossible
for Sidney Johnston to hold Kentucky and Tennessee unless the Mississippi,
running parallel with his communications, and the Cumberland and
Tennessee, running in their rear, should remain sealed to the enemy. It
was equally impracticable to hold the region bordering upon the North
Carolina sounds after the fall of Roanoke Island. After the fall of New
Orleans, the entire avenue of the Mississippi, except the limited section
between Vicksburg and Port Hudson, was open to the enemy, giving him bases
of operations upon both its banks, and opening to his ravages vast
sections of the Confederacy.
Thus had the naval supremacy of the enemy brought him, in a few days, to
the very heart of extensive sections of territory, which never could have
been reduced to his sway, had he been compelled to fight his way overland
from his frontiers. Thus was the great element of _space_, usually so
potent in the defense of an invaded people, annihilated, almost before the
struggle had been fairly begun.
The upper regions of Eastern Virginia, remote from the navigable
tributaries of the Atlantic and the larger rivers, was the only theatre of
war, where the superior valor and skill of the Confederates could claim
success from the Federal hosts, deprived of their gunboats and water
communications. Here, though not entirely neutralized, his water
facilities did not at all times avail the enemy; here the struggle was
more equal, and here was demonstrated that superior manhood and
soldiership of the South, which, not even an enemy, if candid, will deny.
Of the seven hundred thousand men, which were claimed as under arms for
the preservation of the Union, in the beginning of 1862, it is reasonably
certain that more than a half million were actually in the field, and of
these at least one-half, were operating in Virginia, with Richmond as the
common goal of their eager and expectant gaze. The army of McClellan,
numbering little less than two hundred thousand men, in the vicinity of
Washington, was entitled to the lavish praise, which he bestowed upon it,
in his declaration, that it was "magnificent in material, admirable in
discipline and instruction, excellently equipped and armed." In the valley
of the Shenandoah was the army of Banks, more than fifteen thousand
strong. General Fremont, with about the same force, commanded the
"Mountain Department," embracing the highland region of Western Virginia.
By the first of March these various commands, with other detachments, had
reached an aggregate of quite two hundred and fifty thousand men.
We have sufficiently described those causes, by which the already
disproportionate strength of the Confederates, previous to the adoption of
the conscription act, and the inception of the more vigorous and stringent
military policy of the Confederate Government, was reduced to a condition
in most alarming contrast with the enormous preparations of the enemy.
General Joseph E. Johnston still held his position, with a force which, on
the first of March, barely exceeded forty thousand men. The command of
General Stonewall Jackson, in the Shenandoah Valley, did not exceed
thirty-five hundred, embracing all arms. General Magruder held the
Peninsula of York and James Rivers, covering the approaches to Richmond in
that direction, with eleven thousand men, and General Huger had at Norfolk
and in the vicinity not more than ten thousand. The Confederate force in
Western Virginia was altogether too feeble for successful defense, and
indeed, the Government had some months previous abandoned the hope of a
permanent occupation of that region.
The Confederate authorities had long since ceased to cherish hope of
offensive movements upon the line of the Potomac. Circumstances imposed a
defensive attitude, attended with many causes of peculiar apprehension for
the fate of the issue in Virginia. Weeks of critical suspense, and
vigilant observation of the threatening movements of the Federal forces,
were followed by the transfer of the principal scene of operations to the
Peninsula.
The evacuation of the position so long held by General Johnston at
Manassas, executed with many evidences of skill, but attended with much
destruction of valuable material, was followed immediately by an advance
of General McClellan to that place. The necessity of a retirement by
General Johnston to an interior line had been duly appreciated by the
Confederate Government, though there were circumstances attending the
immediate execution of the movement, which detracted from its otherwise
complete success. The destruction of valuable material, including an
extensive meat-curing establishment, containing large supplies of meat,
and established by the Government, which ensued upon the evacuation of
Manassas, elicited much exasperated censure. Similar occurrences at the
evacuation of Yorktown, a few weeks later, revived a most unpleasant
recollection of scenes incident to the retreat from Manassas. The
extravagant destruction of property, in many instances apparently reckless
and wanton, marking the movements of the Confederate armies at this
period, was a bitter sarcasm upon the practice, by many of its prominent
officers, of that economy of resources which the necessities of the
Confederacy so imperatively demanded.
Not only the weakness of his forces indicated to General Johnston the
perils of his position, but the territorial configuration again came to
the aid of the enemy, and gave to General McClellan the option of several
avenues to the rear of the Confederate army. It is not improbable that
McClellan appreciated the extremity of Johnston's situation, and has,
indeed, assigned other reasons for his advance upon Manassas than the
expectation of an engagement, where the chances would have been
overwhelmingly in his favor. At all events, the retirement of General
Johnston to the line of the Rapidan, imposed upon the Federal general an
immediate choice of a base from which to assail the Confederate capital.
Originally opposed to an overland movement _via_ Manassas, McClellan was
now compelled to abandon his favorite plan of a movement from Urbanna, on
the Rappahanock, by which he hoped to cut off the Confederate retreat to
Richmond, in consequence of Johnston's retirement behind the Rappahanock.
General McClellan promptly adopted the movement to the peninsula, a plan
which he had previously considered, but which he regarded "as less
brilliant and less promising decisive results."[52]
When General Johnston left Manassas, it is probable that he was not fully
decided as to the position which he should select. Receiving a
dispatch[53] from President Davis, he halted the army, and immediately the
President left Richmond for Johnston's head-quarters, for the purpose of
consultation. General Johnston's position now was simply observatory of
the enemy. It was yet possible that McClellan might undertake an overland
movement; and, indeed, a portion of his force had followed the retreating
Confederates. In that event Johnston would occupy the line upon which Lee
subsequently foiled so many formidable Federal demonstrations. From his
central position he could also promptly meet a serious demonstration
against Richmond from the Chesapeake waters or the Shenandoah Valley. When
the numerous transports at Fortress Monroe, debarking troops for the
peninsula, revealed the enemy's real purpose, the army of General Johnston
was carried to the lines of Magruder, at Yorktown. Johnston was, however,
decidedly opposed to the movement to the Peninsula, declaring it
untenable, and urging views as to the requirements of the situation, which
competent criticism has repeatedly commended.
While the transfer of Johnston's army to the Peninsula was in process of
execution, the situation in Virginia was, in the highest degree, critical.
The strength of Magruder was necessarily so divided, that the actual
force, defending the line threatened by McClellan with eighty thousand
men, was less than six thousand Confederates. Meanwhile the various
Federal detachments in other quarters were coöperating with the main
movement of McClellan. Banks and Shields were expected, by their
overwhelming numbers, to crush Jackson in the Shenandoah Valley, and then,
forming a junction with the large force of Fremont, who was required to
capture Staunton, it was designed that these combined forces should unite
with the army of McDowell, advancing from the direction of Fredericksburg,
at some point east of the Blue Ridge. Thus a force, aggregating more than
seventy thousand men, threatening Richmond from the north, was to unite
with McClellan advancing from the east. Such was, in brief, the Federal
plan of campaign, which the North expected to accomplish the reduction of
Richmond and the total destruction of the Confederate power in Virginia.
It does not devolve upon us to discuss, in detail, the defects of this
faulty combination, but the sequel will show how promptly and triumphantly
the Confederate leaders availed themselves of the opportunity presented by
this crude arrangement of their adversaries.
Happily the bold attitude and skillful dispositions of Magruder were aided
by the over-tentative action of his antagonist. The latter, greatly
exaggerating the force in his front, and convinced of the hopelessness of
an assault upon the Confederate works, permitted the escape of the golden
moment, and prepared for a regular siege of Yorktown. In the meantime
General Magruder describes his situation to have been as follows:
"Through the energetic action of the Government, reënforcements began to
pour in, and each hour the Army of the Peninsula grew stronger and
stronger, until anxiety passed from my mind as to the result of an attack
upon us."
The untenability of the Peninsula was very soon made apparent, and the
important advantage of _time_ having been gained, and the escape of
General Huger's command from its precarious position at Norfolk secured,
General Johnston abandoned the works at Yorktown, retreating to the line
of the Chickahominy, near Richmond. This movement was made in obedience to
the necessities of the situation, and was in accordance with his original
desire for a decisive engagement with McClellan, at an interior point,
where a concentration of the Confederate forces would be more practicable.
General McClellan did not pursue the retreating column with much energy
after the decisive blow given his advance at Williamsburg, by Longstreet.
With the arrival of Johnston upon the Richmond lines, the Confederate
Government began, with energy and rapidity, the concentration of its
forces. The superb command of Huger was promptly transferred to Johnston,
and troops from the Carolinas were thrown forward to Richmond as rapidly
as transportation facilities would permit. By the last of May the
Confederate forces in front of Richmond reached an aggregate of
seventy-five thousand men. McClellan had sustained losses on the Peninsula
which reduced his strength to the neighborhood of one hundred and twenty
thousand.
A cruel necessity of the evacuation of Norfolk and Portsmouth was the
destruction of the Confederate iron-clad "Virginia," which had so long
prevented the ascent of James River by the Federal gunboats. So invaluable
was this vessel in the defense of Richmond, that McClellan had named, as
an essential condition of a successful campaign on the Peninsula, that she
should be "neutralized." It was found impossible to convey the Virginia to
a point unoccupied on either shore of the river by the enemy's forces,
and, by order of her commander, the vessel was destroyed. Immediately a
fleet ascended the river for the purpose of opening the water highway to
the Confederate capital.
The intelligence of the destruction of the "Virginia," and the advance of
the Federal fleet, was received, in Richmond, with profound consternation.
No one, unless at that time in Richmond, can realize the sense of extreme
peril experienced by the public. There were few who dared indulge the hope
of a successful defense of the city against the dreaded "gunboats" and
"monitors" of the enemy, which, the people then believed, were alike
invulnerable and irresistible.
The wise precautionary measures of the Government, in preparing its
archives for removal, in case of emergency, to a point of safety, greatly
increased the panic of the public. Rumors of a precipitate evacuation of
the city, by the Confederate authorities, were circulated, and there was
wanting no possible element which could aggravate the public alarm, save
the calm demeanor of President Davis, and the deliberate efforts of the
authorities--Confederate, State, and municipal--to assure the safety of
the city. The courage and confidence of the President, in the midst of
this almost universal alarm, in which many officers of the Government
participated, quickly aroused an enthusiastic and determined spirit in the
hearts of a brave people. Knowing the critical nature of the emergency, he
was nevertheless resolved to exhaust every expedient in the defense of
Richmond, and then to abide the issue. His noble and defiant declaration
was: "I am ready and willing to leave my bones in the capital of the
Confederacy." In response to resolutions from the Virginia Legislature,
urging the defense of the city to the last extremity, he avowed his
predetermined resolution to hold Richmond until driven out by the enemy,
and animated his hearers by an assurance of his conviction, that, even in
that contingency, "the war could be successfully maintained, upon Virginia
soil, for twenty years."[54]
The accounts of the enemy were required to demonstrate to the citizens of
Richmond, that, by the obstructions in the channel of the river, and the
erection of the impregnable batteries at Drewry's Bluff, their homes were
again secured from the presence of the invaders. The significance of that
brief engagement, during which the guns were distinctly audible in
Richmond, was very soon made evident in the loss of their terrors by the
Federal gunboats. President Davis was a spectator of the engagement, by
which the Confederate capital was rescued from imminent peril of capture.
But the repulse of the gunboats in James River, with its assuring and
significant incidents, was the precursor of far more brilliant successes,
which, it was evident, would largely affect the decision of the general
issue in Virginia. In the months of May and June, 1862, was enacted the
memorable "Valley campaign" of Stonewall Jackson--a campaign which, never
excelled, has no parallel in brilliant and accurate conception, celerity,
and perfection of execution, save the Italian campaign of Napoleon in
1796. General Jackson's exploits in the Valley of the Shenandoah present
an aggregate of military achievements unrivaled by any record in American
history.
On the 23d of March, Jackson fought the battle of Kernstown, near
Winchester, with three thousand Virginians against eighteen full Federal
regiments, sustaining, throughout an entire day, an audacious assault upon
Shields' force, and at dark leisurely retiring with his command, after
having inflicted upon the enemy a loss nearly equal to his own strength.
Elsewhere has been mentioned the effort made to induce President Davis to
remove Jackson, in compliance with the popular dissatisfaction at his
failure to achieve, against such overwhelming odds, more palpable fruits
of victory. The immediate consequence of Kernstown was the check of Banks'
advance in the Valley, and the recall of a large force, then on the way
from Banks to aid McClellan's designs against Johnston.
Leaving General Ewell, whose division had been detached from Johnston, to
intercept any demonstration by Banks in the Valley, or across the Blue
Ridge, Jackson united his command with that of General Edward Johnson, a
full brigade, and defeating the advance of Fremont, under Milroy, at
McDowell, compelled a disorderly retreat by Fremont through the mountains
of Western Virginia. Returning to the Valley, he assaulted, with his
united force, the column of Banks, annihilated an entire division of the
enemy, pursued its fugitive remnants to the Potomac, and threatened the
safety of the Federal capital. Alarmed for Washington, Mr. Lincoln halted
McDowell in his plans of coöperation with McClellan, and for weeks the
efforts of the Federal Government were addressed to the paramount purpose
of "catching Jackson." Eluding the enemy's combinations, Jackson turned
upon his pursuers, again defeated Fremont at Cross Keys, and immediately
crossing the Shenandoah, secured his rear, and destroyed the advance of
Shields within sight of its powerless confederate. Resuming the retreat,
Jackson paused at Weyer's Cave, and awaited the summons of his superiors
to enact his thrilling rôle in the absorbing drama at Richmond. Within the
short period of seventy days, Jackson achieved at Kernstown, McDowell's,
Front Royal, Winchester, Strasburg, Harrisonburg, Cross Keys, and Port
Republic, eight tactical victories, besides innumerable successful
combats. But he had done more. He had wrought the incomparable strategic
achievement of neutralizing sixty thousand men with fifteen thousand; he
had recalled McDowell, when, with outstretched arm, McClellan had already
planted his right wing, under Porter, at Hanover Court-house, to receive
the advance of the coöperating column from Fredericksburg.
Meanwhile the lines of Richmond had been the scene of no incident of
special interest until the battle of "Seven Pines," on the 31st of May.
After his arrival upon the Chickahominy, McClellan had been steadily
fortifying his lines, and wherever an advance was practicable, preparing
approaches to Richmond. His line, extending over a space of several miles,
was accurately described by the course of the Chickahominy, from the
village of Mechanicsville, five miles north of Richmond, to a point about
four miles from the city, in an easterly direction. Having partially
executed his design of bridging the Chickahominy, McClellan had crossed
that stream, and in the last days of May, his left wing was fortified near
the locality designated the "Seven Pines." This initiative demonstration
by McClellan, which placed his army astride a variable stream, was
sufficiently provocative of the enterprise of his antagonist. To increase
the peril of the isolated wing of the Federal army, a thunder-storm,
occurring on the night of the 29th of May, had so swollen the Chickahominy
as to render difficult the accession of reënforcements from the main body.
Such was the situation which invited the Confederate commander to
undertake the destruction of the exposed column of his adversary--a
movement which, if successful, might have resulted in the rout of the
entire left wing of the enemy, opening a way to his rear, and securing his
utter overthrow. Seven Pines was an action, in which the color of victory
was entirely with the Confederates, but it was the least fruitful
engagement fought by the two armies in Virginia. There was no engagement
of the war in which the valor of the Confederate soldier was more
splendidly illustrated, though happily that quality then did not require
so conspicuous a test. However able in design, it was in execution a
signal failure--a series of loose, indefinite and disjointed movements,
wanting in coöperation, and apparently in able executive management.
President Davis, in company with General Lee, was present during most of
the engagement. Frequently under fire, and in consultation with his
generals in exposed positions, he was conspicuous chiefly by his efforts
to animate the troops, and his presence was greeted with evidences of the
enthusiasm and confidence which it inspired.
The battle of "Seven Pines," in itself barren of influence upon the
decision of the campaign, was nevertheless attended by an incident--the
painful and disabling wound received by General Johnston, in all
probability decisive of the future history of the Army of Northern
Virginia. Leading to an immediate and positive change of policy, it is
hardly a bold declaration that this incident determined the future of the
war in Virginia.
A disposition has been freely indulged to influence the sentence of
history, by placing President Davis and General Johnston in a sort of
antithetical juxtaposition, as exponents of different theories as to the
proper conduct of the war by the South. In view of the failure of the
Confederacy, it has been ingeniously contended that the result vindicated
the wisdom of General Johnston's views. But besides its evident unfairness
to Mr. Davis, no criticism could be founded less upon the intrinsic merits
of the case. Overzealous and intemperate partisans generally evince
aptitude in the exaggeration of minor differences between the leaders,
whose interests they profess to have at heart. Such results are not
unfrequent in the lives of eminent public men. In the case of General
Beauregard, the unhappy effects of officious intermeddling and
misrepresentation, from such sources, between the President and that
distinguished officer, are especially notable.
But the assumption that events have indicated the wisdom of General
Johnston's views, in their declared antagonism to those of Mr. Davis, is
altogether unsustained. The immediate results of a change of commanders,
and a consequent inauguration of a different policy[55]--a policy in
accordance with Mr. Davis' own views, may, with far more reason, be
alleged in support of a contrary theory. The vigorous and aggressive
policy adopted and executed by Lee not only accorded with the wishes of
the President, but fulfilled the long-deferred popular expectation, and
agreeably disappointed the public in Lee's capacity. For despite the
general disappointment at the absence of decisive achievements by the Army
of Northern Virginia, General Johnston commanded far more of public
confidence, than did General Lee at the period of the latter's accession
to command.
Nothing could have been more disadvantageous to Lee, than the contrast so
freely indicated between himself and other officers. Johnston was
criticised merely because of the absence of brilliant and decisive
achievements. Lee was assumed to have proven his incompetency by egregious
failure. He was ridiculed as a closet general. His campaigns were said to
exist only on paper--to consist of slow methodical tactics, and incessant
industry with the spade, and he was pronounced totally deficient in
aggressive qualities. A prominent Richmond editor, criticising his
North-western Virginia campaign, asserted that the unvarying intelligence
from Lee was that he was "hopelessly stuck in the mud," and an officer was
heard to compare him to a terrapin, needing the application of a hot coal
to his back to compel him to action. But with the lapse of a fortnight
that army, which received the intelligence of Lee's appointment to command
with misgiving and distrust, began to experience renewed life and hope. It
was not the few additional brigades given to that army which so soon
started it upon its irresistible career of victory. A mighty hand
projected its impetus, and directed its magnificent valor against those
miles of intrenchments which it had seen grow more and more formidable,
itself meanwhile an inactive spectator.
Lee found the army within sight of Richmond; he lifted it from the mud of
the Chickahominy, defeated an enemy intrenched and in superior force;
pursued the panting and disheartened fugitives to the shelter of their
shipping; defeated a second army--then both together--within hearing of
the Federal capital; fought an indecisive battle upon the enemy's soil,
and reëstablished the Confederate line upon the frontier. Is it a matter
of wonder that the President, the army, and the people recognized the
significance of these results, and applauded the substitution of the new
system and the new status for the old? A better explanation of so
pronounced a contrast is needed than that the "prejudice" or "injustice"
of Davis withheld from Johnston, five or even ten thousand men, which he
gave to Lee.
Yet there could be no hypothesis more presumptuous, in view of the
abundant testimony of competent military judgment, and none more palpably
untenable, than that which would deny greatness as a soldier to Johnston.
As a consummate master of strategy, in that sense which contemplates the
movements of heavy masses, and looks to grand ultimate results, Johnston
has probably few equals. His sagacity in the divination of an enemy's
designs is remarkable; and if he be considered as having marked
deficiencies, they must be counted as a lack of Jackson's audacity, of
Lee's confident calculation and executive perfection. The South regards
Lee as beyond criticism. Jefferson Davis is accustomed to say "the world
has rarely produced a man to be compared with Lee." Yet in mere
intellectuality, it is at least questionable whether Johnston had his
superior among the Southern leaders.
But it often happens that qualities, however great, are not those which
the occasion demands. That marvelous union of qualities in Lee, which has
placed him almost above parallel, probably made him alone adequate to the
hazardous posture of affairs at Richmond in the summer of 1862. The
result, at least, made evident to the world, the wisdom of the President,
in that choice, which was at first declared the undeserved reward of an
incompetent favorite.
Whatever may be alleged to the contrary, President Davis at all times, to
the full extent of his power, aided General Johnston in the consummation
of his designs. To assert that, upon any occasion, he either interposed
obstacles to Johnston's success, or denied him any means in his power to
confer, is to question that personal fidelity of Jefferson Davis, which
his bitterest enemy should be ashamed to deny. Few Southern men, at least,
have yet attained that measure of malignity, or that hardihood of
mendacity.
General Lee was not dilatory in his preparations to gratify that longing
aspiration which the President, on his own behalf, and in the name of the
country, briefly expressed, that "something should be done." Lee had a
_carte blanche_, but frequent and anxious were the consultations between
the President and himself. The world now knows what followed those days
and nights of anxious conference, in which were weighed the chances of
success, the cost of victory, and the possibilities of defeat. The plan
executed by General Lee was one of the most hazardous ever attempted in
war, but it was not less brilliant than bold, and at least one precedent
had been furnished by the great master of the art of war at Austerlitz.
Its perils were obvious, but the sublime confidence of Lee in the success
of his combinations went far to secure its own justification.
During the week of engagements which followed, the President was
constantly with the army and fully advised of its movements.[56] The
cordial recognition of this advisory relation between himself and Lee, is
indicated by the natural pride, and becoming sense of justice, with which
the latter, in the report of his operations against McClellan, mentions
the approving presence of the President, during the execution of his
plans. This noble harmony between Davis and Lee, equally creditable to
each, was never interrupted by one single moment of discord. It was never
marred by dictation on one side, or complaint on the other. Unlike other
commanders, Lee never complained of want of means, or of opportunity for
the execution of his plans. Satisfied that the Government was extending
all the aid in its power, he used, to the best advantage, the means at
hand and created his opportunities. Lee never charged the President with
improper interference with the army, but freely counseled with his
constitutional commander-in-chief, whom he knew to be worthy of the trust
conferred by the country in the control of its armies. President Davis
fully comprehended and respected the jealous functions of military
command, and in the exercise of that trust no one would have more quickly
resented unauthorized official interference. A soldier himself, he
recognized freedom of action as the privilege of the commander; as a
statesman, he rendered that cordial coöperation, which is the duty of
government.
When Lee had driven McClellan from his position along the Chickahominy, he
had raised the siege of Richmond. The retreat of McClellan to the James
River, conducted with such admirable skill, and aided by good fortune,
placed the Federal army in a position where, secure itself, another
offensive movement against the Confederate capital might, in time, be
undertaken. Confederate strategy, however, soon relieved Richmond from the
apprehension of attack, and in less than two months from the termination
of the pursuit of McClellan, Lee, by a series of masterly strokes,
demolished the armies under Pope, united for the defense of Washington,
and was preparing an invasion of Maryland.
An almost magical change in the fortunes of the Confederacy was wrought by
these active and brilliant operations, embracing so short a period, and
marked by results of such magnitude.
Not only were the two main armies of the enemy defeated, but the entire
Federal campaign in the East had been entirely disconcerted. Richmond was
saved, Washington menaced, and McClellan forced back to the initial point
of his campaign. Western Virginia, the Carolina coast, and other
localities, for months past in Federal occupation, were almost divested of
troops to swell the hosts gathering for the rescue of Washington, and to
meet the dreaded advance, northward, of Lee's invincible columns. From the
heart of Virginia the cloud of war was again lifted to the Potomac
frontier; the munificent harvests of the valley counties, of Fauquier,
Loudon, and the fertile contiguous territory, were again in Confederate
possession, and a numerous and victorious army was now anxious to be led
across the Rubicon of the warring sections.
From harrowing apprehension, from vague dread of indefinable but imminent
peril, the South was transported to the highest round of confident
expectation. The North, which, in the last days of June, eagerly awaited
intelligence of McClellan's capture of Richmond, now regarded its own
capital as doomed, and did not permit itself to breathe freely until
McClellan announced the _safety of Pennsylvania_, when Lee had retired to
Virginia.
The inducements which invited a movement of the Confederate forces across
the Potomac were manifold. Whatever judgment the result may now suggest,
the invasion of Maryland was alike dictated by sound military policy and
justified by those moral considerations which are ever weighty in war. The
overwhelming defeat of Pope more than realized the hope of President Davis
and General Lee, when the strategic design of a movement northward was put
in execution, by which was sought the double purpose of withdrawing
McClellan from James River and effectually checking the advance of Pope.
The successive and decisive defeats of Pope offered the prospect of an
offensive by which the splendid successes of the campaign might be crowned
with even more valuable achievements. Demoralized, disheartened, in every
way disqualified for effectual resistance, the remnants of the armies
which Lee had beaten, each in succession, and then combined, would be an
easy prey to his victorious legions, could they be brought to a decisive
field engagement. There yet remained time, before the end of the season of
active operations, for crushing blows at the enemy, which would finish the
work thus far triumphantly successful.
To inflict still greater damage upon the enemy--to so occupy him upon the
frontier as to prevent another demonstration against Richmond during the
present year--to indicate friendship and sympathy for the oppressed people
of Maryland--to derive such aid from them as their condition would enable
them to extend, were the potent inducements inviting the approbation of
the Confederate authorities to a movement across the Potomac. President
Davis was pledged to an invasion of the enemy's country whenever it should
prove practicable. Now, if ever, that policy was to be initiated. Hitherto
the enemy's power, not the will of the Confederate Government, had
prevented. Now that power was shattered. The mighty fabric trembled to its
base, and who would now venture to estimate the consequences of a
brilliant victory by Lee, on Maryland soil, in September, 1862? What
supporter of the Union can now dwell, without a shudder, upon the
imagination, even, of a repetition, at Antietam, of the story of the
Chickahominy, or Second Manassas?
The climax of the Maryland campaign was the battle of Antietam--a drawn
battle, but followed by the early withdrawal of the Confederate army into
Virginia. It is unnecessary to dwell upon the causes conspiring to give
this portion of the campaign many of the features of failure. With a force
greatly reduced by the straggling of his weary and exhausted troops, Lee
was unable to administer the crushing blow which he had hoped to
deliver.[57] As a consequence, the people of Maryland, of whom a large
majority were thoroughly patriotic and warm in their Southern sympathies,
were not encouraged to make that effective demonstration which would
inevitably have followed a defeat of McClellan.
Nevertheless, there was some compensation in the terrible punishment
inflicted upon the enemy at Antietam; and there was the heightened
prestige, so greatly valued by the South at this period, in the eyes of
Europe, arising from the temper and capacity of the weaker combatant to
undertake so bold an enterprise. In the tangible evidences of success
afforded by the capture of Harper's Ferry, with its numerous garrison
supplies of arms and military stores, was seen additional compensation for
the abandonment of the scheme of invasion.
An interval of repose was permitted the Army of Northern Virginia, after
its return from Maryland, in its encampments near Winchester, during which
it was actively strengthened and recruited to the point of adequate
preparation for expected demonstrations of the enemy.
The operations of the Western army, in many respects, were a brilliant
counterpart to the campaign in Virginia, though lacking its brilliant
fruits. We have mentioned the circumstance which placed General Braxton
Bragg in command of the Western army, after its successful evacuation of
Corinth. General Bragg was equally high in the confidence of the President
and the Southern people. Greatly distinguished by his services in Mexico,
his skillful handling, at Shiloh, of the magnificent corps of troops,
which his discipline had made a model of efficiency, more than confirmed
his Mexican fame.
Space does not permit us to follow, in detail, the execution of the able
and comprehensive strategy, by which General Bragg relieved large sections
of Tennessee and Alabama from the presence of the enemy, penetrated the
heart of Kentucky, maintained an active offensive during the summer, and
transferred the seat of war to the Federal frontier. A part of these
operations was the hurried retreat of Buell's immense army, from its posts
in Alabama and Tennessee, for the defense of Louisville and Cincinnati;
large captures of prisoners, horses, arms and military stores; and the
brilliant progress and successive victories of Kirby Smith and Morgan. For
weeks the situation in Kentucky seemed to promise the unqualified success
of the entire Western campaign. There was, indeed, reasonable hope of a
permanent occupation of the larger portion of Kentucky and Tennessee by
the Confederate forces.
But the battle of Perryville--an engagement not unlike Antietam in its
doubtful claim as a Federal victory--was followed by the retreat of
General Bragg, which was executed with skill, and with results going far
to relieve the disappointment of the popular hope of a permanent
occupation of Kentucky. Buell, on his arrival at Louisville, whither he
had retreated, received heavy reënforcements, which greatly increased his
already superior numbers; and Perryville, a battle which General Bragg
fought, rather to secure his retreat than with the expectation of a
decisive victory, would have been an overwhelming Confederate success, had
Bragg been sufficiently strong to follow up his advantage.
No Confederate commander, save Lee and Jackson, was ever able to present a
claim of a successful campaign so well grounded as the Kentucky campaign
of Bragg. With a force of forty thousand men, he killed, wounded, and
captured more than twenty thousand of the enemy; took thirty pieces of
artillery, thousands of small arms; a large supply of wagons, harness, and
horses; and an immense amount of subsistence, ample not only for the
support of his own army, but of other forces of the Confederacy. During
the succeeding autumn and winter, Bragg's army was conspicuous for its
superior organization, admirable condition and tone; was abundantly
supplied with food and clothing, and in larger numbers than when it
started upon its campaign in August. Moreover, General Bragg redeemed
North Alabama and Middle Tennessee, and recovered possession of Cumberland
Gap, the doorway, through the mountains, to Knoxville and the Virginia and
Tennessee Railroad--the main avenue from Richmond to the heart of the
Confederacy. Evincing his determination to hold the recovered territory,
General Bragg, within a month from his return from Kentucky, was
confronting the principal army of the enemy, in the West, before
Nashville.
Incidental to the movement of Bragg into Kentucky, and constituting a part
of the programme, attempted upon the large theatre of the Western
campaign, were the repulse of the first attack of the enemy upon
Vicksburg, the partial failure of General Breckinridge's expedition to
Baton Rouge, and the serious reverse sustained by Van Dorn at Corinth. In
connection with the more important demonstration into Kentucky, these
incidents of the Western campaign may be briefly aggregated as the
recovery of the country between Nashville and Chattanooga, and the
important advantage of a secure occupation of Vicksburg and Port Hudson,
thus closing the Mississippi to the enemy for two hundred miles.
Subsequent operations in Virginia, at the close of 1862, were entirely
favorable to the Confederacy. While the two armies were confronting each
other, with the imminent prospect of active and important operations,
General McClellan was relieved, and one of his corps commanders, General
Burnside, assigned to the command of the Federal army of the Potomac. As
is now universally acknowledged, General McClellan was sacrificed to the
clamor of a political faction. By this act Mr. Lincoln became responsible
for much of the ill-fortune which awaited the Federal arms in Virginia.
Perhaps among his countrymen, a Southern tribute to General McClellan may
constitute but feeble praise. He was unquestionably the ablest and most
accomplished soldier exhibited by the war on the Northern side. "Had there
been no McClellan," General Meade is reported to have said, "there would
have been no Grant." In retirement, if not exile, General McClellan saw
the armies which his genius created, achieve undeserved distinction for
men, his inferiors in all that constitutes true generalship. He saw the
feeble and wasted remnant of an army, with which he had grappled in the
day of its glory and strength, surrender to a multitudinous host, doubly
as large as the army with which he had given Lee his first check at
Antietam. A true soldier, McClellan was also a true gentleman, an enemy
whose talents the South respects none the less, because he did not
wantonly ravage its homes, nor make war upon the helpless, the aged, and
infirm. President Davis, who, while Federal Secretary of War, conferred
upon McClellan a special distinction, held his genius and attainments in
high estimation. He received the intelligence of his removal with profound
satisfaction.
The North was not required to wait long for a competent test of the new
commander's capacity. Foiled and deceived by Lee, in a series of
maneuvres, the results of which made him only less ridiculous than the
gasconading Pope among Federal commanders, Burnside finally assailed Lee,
on the 13th December, at Fredericksburg. The result was a bloody
slaughter, unequaled in previous annals of the war, an overwhelming
repulse, and a demoralized retreat across the Rappahannock.
The Western campaign terminated with the battle of Murfreesboro'. The
Federal commander, Rosecrans, the successor of Buell, advanced from
Nashville to drive Bragg from his position. A brilliant and vigorous
attack by Bragg, on the 31st December, routed an entire wing of the
Federal army; on the second day the action was more favorable to
Rosecrans, who had retreated, after his reverse on the first day, to
stronger positions. Receiving information that the enemy was strongly
reënforcing, General Bragg fell back to Tullahoma, a position more
favorable for strategic and defensive purposes.
The transfer, after the battle of Shiloh, of the troops of Price and Van
Dorn to the army east of the Mississippi, had almost divested the
Trans-Mississippi Department of interest in the public mind. After Elk
Horn, there was but one considerable engagement, in 1862, west of the
Mississippi. This was the battle of Prairie Grove, a fruitless victory,
won by General Hindman, about the middle of December. The country north of
the Arkansas River continued to be nominally held by the Federal forces.
Thus, in nearly every quarter, the second year of the war terminated with
events favorable to the prospects of Southern independence. Though the
territorial jurisdiction of the Confederacy was contracted, the world was
not far from regarding the task of subjugation as already a demonstrated
and hopeless failure. All the invasive campaigns of the enemy, save the
first shock of his overwhelming onsets against weak and untenable posts,
in the winter and early spring, had been brought to grief, and nowhere had
he maintained himself away from his water facilities. An unexampled
prestige among nations now belonged to the infant power, which had carried
its arms from the Tennessee to the Ohio, had achieved a week of victories
before its own capital, and carried the war back to its threshold. After
such achievements the Southern Confederacy rightly claimed from those
powers which have assumed to be the arbiters of international right an
instant recognition upon the list of declared and established
nationalities.
In our brief and cursory glance at military operations, we have omitted to
mention the action of the Government designed to promote the successful
prosecution of the war. This action is mainly comprehended by the various
suggestions of the President's messages to Congress. These recommendations
related chiefly to measures having in view the increased efficiency of the
service. He invited the attention of Congress, especially, to the
necessity of measures securing the proper execution of the conscription
law, and the consolidation of companies, battalions and regiments, when so
reduced in strength as to impair that uniformity of organization, which
was necessary in the army. Legislation was urged, having in view a better
control of military transportation on the railroads, and the improvement
of their defective condition. The President also recommended various
propositions relating to organization of the army, and an extension of the
provisions of the conscription law, embracing persons between the ages of
thirty-five and forty-five years.
About the middle of December President Davis visited the camps of the
Western Department, spending several weeks in obtaining information as to
the condition and wants of that section of the Confederacy, and devising
expedients for a more successful defense in a quarter where the
Confederate cause was always seriously menaced. His presence was highly
beneficial in allaying popular distrust, founded upon the supposition that
Virginia and the Atlantic region engrossed the attention of the Government
to the exclusion of concern for the West and the Mississippi Valley. When
the President returned to Richmond, there were signs of popular animation
in the South-west, which justified a more confident hope of the cause,
than the South was permitted to indulge at any other period of the
struggle.
An incident of this visit was the address of the President before the
Mississippi Legislature. The warm affection of Mr. Davis for Mississippi
is more than reciprocated by the noble and chivalrous people of that
State. He was always proud of the confidence reposed in him by such a
community, and Mississippi can never abate her affection for one who so
illustrated her name in the council chamber and upon the field of battle.
In this address he alluded, with much tenderness, to this reciprocal
attachment, declaring, that though "as President of the Confederate
States, he had determined to make no distinction between the various parts
of the country--to know no separate State--yet his heart always beat more
warmly for Mississippi, and he had looked on Mississippi soldiers with a
pride and emotion, such as no others inspired."
Declaring that his course had been dictated by the sincere purpose of
promoting the cause of independence, he admonished the country to prepare
for a desperate contest, with a power armed for the purposes of conquest
and subjugation. He characterized severely the conduct of the war by the
North. Reviewing its progress, and recounting the immense disadvantages,
with which the South contended, he maintained that the South should
congratulate itself on its achievements, and not complain that more had
not been accomplished. The conscription law was explained and defended as
to many of its features not clearly understood by the people. We give an
extract from Mr. Davis' remarks as to the Confederate conscription, a
subject of vast misrepresentation during the war, and of much ignorant
censure since:
"I am told that this act has excited some discontentment, and that it
has provoked censure far more severe, I believe, than it deserves. It
has been said that it exempts the rich from military service, and
forces the poor to fight the battles of the country. The poor do,
indeed, fight the battles of the country. It is the poor who save
nations and make revolutions. But is it true that, in this war, the
men of property have shrunk from the ordeal of the battle-field? Look
through the army; cast your eyes upon the maimed heroes of the war
whom you meet in your streets and in the hospitals; remember the
martyrs of the conflict; and I am sure you will find among them more
than a fair proportion drawn from the ranks of men of property. The
object of that portion of the act which exempts those having charge of
twenty or more negroes, was not to draw any distinction of classes,
but simply to provide a force, in the nature of a police force,
sufficient to keep our negroes in control. This was the sole object of
the clause. Had it been otherwise, it would never have received my
signature. As I have already said, we have no cause to complain of the
rich. All our people have done well; and, while the poor have nobly
discharged their duties, most of the wealthiest and most distinguished
families of the South have representatives in the ranks. I take, as an
example, the case of one of your own representatives in Congress, who
was nominated for Congress and elected, but still did a sentinel's
duty until Congress met. Nor is this a solitary instance, for men of
largest fortune in Mississippi are now serving in the ranks."
The President strongly and eloquently recommended the provision by the
Legislature for the families of the absent soldiers of Mississippi. Said
he: "Let this provision be made for the objects of his affection and his
solicitude, and the soldier, engaged in fighting the battles of his
country, will no longer be disturbed in his slumbers by dreams of an
unprotected and neglected family at home. Let him know that his mother
Mississippi has spread her protecting mantle over those he loves, and he
will be ready to fight your battles, to protect your honor, and in your
cause to die."
The address concluded with an earnest appeal for unrelaxed exertion, and
the declaration that, "in all respects, moral as well as physical, the
Confederacy was better prepared than it was a year previous"--a
declaration verified not less by the favorable situation than by the
evident apprehension of the North and the expectations of Europe.